Abstract

CARRETTI, Barbara; BOSIO, Cristiana; DE BENI, Rossana  and  CORNOLDI, Cesare. Reading comprehension in oral and silent reading: an analysis of reading times and accuracy. Neuropsicologia Latinoamericana [online]. 2012, vol.4, n.spe, pp. 34-42. ISSN 2075-9479.  http://dx.doi.org/10.5579/rnl.2012.0100.

The objective of this study is to analyze the effect of reading modality on reading comprehension performance in primary school students, analyzing also the role of individual differences (by comparing good and poor comprehenders). In the first study, 145 students, aged between 9 and 11 years, from year 4 and 5 of the basic primary school of Padova, Italy, were evaluated with two reading comprehension tasks where reading modality was manipulated and were required to a series of multiple choice questions. A subgroup was also evaluated with tasks assessing processes associated with reading comprehension. Texts were presented using a computer to better control the influence of some confusing variables. In this case, participated 112 students, aged between 8 and 11 years from year 4 and 5 of the basic primary school of Padova, Italy. The results demonstrated an advantage of silent reading in terms of efficiency (reading times). However when children were allowed to self-managing reading, comprehension accuracy was negatively affected (Study 1), but this was not the case when text processing was controlled (Study 2). The analysis on processes associated to oral and silent reading revealed a similar pattern of association with the exception of verbal short-term memory which was strictly related to silent reading. Reading modality did not influence the differences between good and poor comprehenders, who reached a lower performance regardless of the request of reading the text silently or orally.

Keywords : Reading aloud; Silent reading; Reading comprehension; Poor comprehenders.

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